Registration and Poster Submissions Open for 2009 AIBS Annual Meeting

April 1, 2009

The 2009 AIBS annual meeting, "Sustainable Agriculture: Greening the Global Food Supply," will be held 18–19 May at the Westin Arlington Gateway Hotel in Arlington, Virginia. The program chair is 2009 AIBS President May R. Berenbaum, of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Registration, poster submission forms, and the preliminary program are online at www.aibs.org/annual-meeting/annual_meeting_2009.

The meeting will bring together plenary speakers, panelists, and discussion groups from the basic and applied life sciences to examine food sustainability, supply, and security. The two-day program is geared toward the science-policy interface for an audience of scientists, educators, students, representatives of nongovernmental organizations, members of Congress, and the media.

The rest of the meeting's program will be rounded out by, among other events, a contributed poster session, AIBS awards, a teachers' workshop organized by the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study and the National Association of Biology Teachers, and a workshop led by the AIBS Public Policy Office focusing on Communicating Science: A Primer for Working with the Media, an AIBS publication.

As a special event, Robert Pennock, of Michigan State University, will give a lecture at 7:00 p.m. on 18 May at the National Academies' Keck Center, in Washington, DC. Pennock, recipient of the 2009 AIBS Outstanding Service Award, will give the lecture "Reason Enough for Scientific Researches: Darwin and the Scientific Virtues." The evening will also include a reception and an after-hours tour of the Koshland Science Center at 6:30 p.m. (The $35 fee for the reception includes return bus transportation from the meeting hotel and after-hours access to the Koshland Science Museum.)

The meeting is taking place during the "Year of Science 2009," a year of activities aimed at engaging the general public in the nature and value of the scientific enterprise. Year of Science 2009, which is co-organized by AIBS and the Coalition on the Public Understanding of Science, involves more than 500 organizations. Recordings of the plenary lectures from the meeting will be available online for free viewing in the AIBS Media Library (www.aibs.org/media-library) about two months after the meeting. The meeting's confirmed speakers and the topics of their presentations are listed below:

Bruce Alberts (Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, University of California, San Francisco; Science editor-in-chief): "Why Redefining Science Education Is the Key to Enhancing the Public Understanding of Science"

May R. Berenbaum (Department of Entomology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign); sustainable agriculture and greening the global food supply

Fred Gould (Department of Entomology, North Carolina State University): "From Transgenic Crops to Transgenic Pests: How Can AgBiotech Be Green?"

Robert Tauxe (National Center for Zoonotic, Vectorborne, and Enteric Diseases; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention); foodborne diseases

Breakout discussion sessions

"What Does the Public Learn from the Media about Sustainable Agriculture?" Cathlyn Stylinski, senior agent, University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science; and Martin Storksdieck, director of project development, Institute of Learning Innovation, Annapolis, Maryland

"Agriculture: From Genes to Landscapes"; David E. Blockstein, National Council for Science and the Environment

"NAS Report on Agriculture and Undergraduate Science Education"; Adam P. Fagen, senior program officer, National Academies Board on Life Sciences

"Changing the Way We Talk about Science: Understanding Science and Year of Science 2009"; Sheri Potter, COPUS Network project manager, AIBS

Workshops

The National Association of Biology Teachers and the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study (BSCS): "Fuels for the Future? Helping Students Use a Systems Approach to Analyze Biofuel Production"; Paul Beardsley, BSCS, of the University of Washington

AIBS Public Policy Office: Communicating Science: A Primer for Working with the Media; Robert Gropp, director of public policy, AIBS